


Awful Coffee, By Herself

by Zofiecfield



Series: Kitchen Stories - Bly Manor - Short One Shots [3]
Category: The Haunting of Bly Manor (TV)
Genre: 1x06 greenhouse scene precursor, Canon Compliant, Domestic Fluff, F/F, Fluff, Implied Sexual Content, Short One Shot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-16
Updated: 2020-12-16
Packaged: 2021-03-11 04:20:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,460
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28099098
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zofiecfield/pseuds/Zofiecfield
Summary: While waiting for Jamie to return to Bly, Dani daydreams and finds ways to the pass the time.  She attempts to make a cup of coffee, among other pursuits.  (Precursor to 1x06 greenhouse scene)
Relationships: Dani Clayton/Jamie
Series: Kitchen Stories - Bly Manor - Short One Shots [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2057895
Comments: 13
Kudos: 89





	Awful Coffee, By Herself

Dani had not seen the sudden flare of framed headlights in days. She had tried, on multiple occasions, to lure them forward, to test the bounds of the fight she’d won, and still, they had not come.

Her mind, it seemed, was her own again, for the first time since the age of nine. She was free to fill its spaces and to think as she pleased.

And it pleased her deeply to think of Jamie. 

Jamie, who would return to the grounds tomorrow morning. 

Jamie, who had asked for nothing. 

Jamie, who, if she would accept, could have everything.

There were too many hours between today and tomorrow, too many hours until the moment Jamie would return. A whole night that would refuse to be rushed along.

Dani put the kids to bed as early as they would permit, then turned to her own room to pass the time until morning, restless.

She set her alarm by Jamie’s clock, to rise with the sun.

At the bathroom sink, she looked straight into the mirror, one final check, one final test. 

Her own reflection stared back, unbroken and unwavering.

_Good._

Dani imagined, as she stood there, how nice it might be to have the weight of Jamie’s chin on her shoulder, to feel those arms slipping around her waist, to look up and see Jamie’s face in the mirror. 

Not instead of her own. Not occupying the space that was rightfully hers.

But shared, tucked in beside hers. Partner, not possessor.

Dani would lean back into her, wrapping an arm around Jamie’s neck and turning to brush lips across cheek.

It would be quiet and familiar, wholly content, the first time and the thousandth.

She found herself smiling at the thought of it, and the smile returned by the mirror was one she had not seen in a very long time.

Tucked in bed, Dani let her mind skip backwards, wandering into the greenhouse in the dark.

The distant crackle of fire and Jamie close enough to touch.

Palms cupped under jaws, fingers wound into hair. 

Warm lips, defiant against the cold night air. Sweet wine on breath and smoke on skin.

Ginger at first, then delightfully less so.

_You sure?_

The gentle wonder of those words, the invitation they presented.

 _Yes_.

Quite sure, in fact. Quite sure that her skin had never wanted anything more, that her heart had never stuttered so pleasantly. 

_Thank fuck,_ indeed.

Her eyes would not skitter away next time, checking the corners for nightmares. There would be no more hesitation.

The blankets around Dani began to warm as the moments ticked by, and she wriggled deeper into the bed. 

Her body, left to its own devices, would be downstairs already, brewing coffee. It would be pacing the greenhouse, wishing the night away, too eager for its own good. 

She forced a deep breath and rested her palms on her belly. She closed her eyes and thought, for the hundredth time, of Jamie’s capable hands.

Jamie's hands, reaching for hers. Jamie's hands, spanning across her skin.

Jamie's hands, wrapped around a glass of beer, keeping to themselves only barely. 

They would sit in a dark corner of the pub, heads bent to hear each other over the din of bodies around them, shoulders brushing. 

Dani would be bold, she decided, resting a hand on Jamie’s knee under the table for a moment, maybe longer, if she dared. 

Jamie, too, would find small excuses to touch. A thumb, light across her forearm in the promise of more to come. Bodies, pressed close as they weave through the crowd.

They’d slip up the stairs after a drink or two, to the flat above, laughing to mask their anticipation and the thrum of possibility between them.

A cup of tea, hot enough to clear their heads for a moment, just enough time to choose with full intention. 

She would lean against the counter, and Jamie would take the opposite side. Their eyes would meet, again and again, over rims of tea cups, under thick eyelashes, wanting, waiting.

When they could stand it no longer, Jamie would cross the kitchen and step in close, resting her weight against Dani. Hands finding hip bones and eyes slipping down to lips, waiting for an answer to the unspoken question. 

Ever patient, Jamie.

Dani would not be so patient. She would catch Jamie and close the last of the distance between them. 

A slow kiss. Slow enough to leave them dizzy, to leave them aching. Slow enough to answer every question. 

Not an ounce of hesitation.

Jamie would take her at her word and the night would welcome them in. 

Lips and teeth and tongues. Quiet words breathed into skin, and then, perhaps, less quiet.

She would let her body do as it wished. Her hands would travel the smooth planes of Jamie, fingertips adventuring boldly, tongue savoring that wonderous new world. 

She would dive headfirst into the intoxicating loss of restraint she’d only ever read about, only ever tasted in her daydreams, and even there, only barely.

Dani let her hands roam as her mind did. Her skin responded, warming under her touch and humming into the room’s silence.

She knew the heat of Jamie’s kiss, the weight of her palm, the depths of her eyes. Each a single burning data point from which to extrapolate. 

And extrapolate she did. 

Dani’s breath rose and rose and rose, hitched and rose again.

Her fingertips found their path readily. She climbed and she did not hold back. 

She had denied this for so long, the wanting, the rampant daydream. 

She had denied the internal combustion that could come from a look, from a touch, from a thought. From the possibility of what might follow. 

She had denied it, she had looked away and bit her tongue. But it had been there all along, simmering below the surface, waiting to boil.

Later, as she slipped into sleep with Jamie’s name still on her lips, her heart thumped a steady beat of _tomorrow._

Dani woke before the alarm went off, the sun only just beginning to lift the darkness. She stretched, joints popping into place.

Daydreams were lovely, and her body sighed, lose and warm in the memory of them. 

But, _today._ Jamie would be back today, and today would be the start of whatever would come. Today, there would be no need for daydreams.

Sweater on. Hair tied back. Teeth and face flushed in cold water.

Knob turned slowly, door swung open inch by inch until she could squeeze through.

She crept down to the kitchen soundlessly, sliding her feet along the wood and skipping the creakiest stair.

There was coffee, she knew, tucked high in the cupboard in the corner of the kitchen. She climbed a chair and dug along the shelf on her tiptoes.

She felt delightfully young. She would have sung to herself a little, under slightly less covert circumstances, but thought better of it.

At the back of the cabinet, she found powdered coffee, expired, if the dust on the lid was any indication. 

She brushed the dust off and brought the canister down anyway. She’d been forbidden from touching the tea, after all.

Dani put the full kettle on the stove and set it to boil. 

She read the faded directions on the back of the coffee canister, but her mind had already skipped ahead to Jamie and greenhouse. She tried a second time, then gave up, settling on a heaping scoop in each mug. 

She caught the kettle just before it whistled and filled the mugs directly. 

She didn’t remember coffee looking so granular. She applied a spoon vigorously to each, but after little progress, decided that the texture would resolve on its own as she walked. 

The mixture, too hot to sip yet, smelled like coffee, which was encouraging. Or at least, it smelled like the faint childhood memory of coffee. 

Close enough to coffee for an excuse to talk to Jamie, close enough for an excuse to find out what could happen next.

Dani shrugged on her coat and picked up both mugs. 

At the back door, she paused for a moment, letting a deep breath fill her broadly and then slowly escape.

The insistent squirm in her gut and the heightened thump of her heart in its cage. 

Nerves on any other day, but today, something else entirely.

She picked her way slowly across the lawn, sloshing coffee over the sides of the cups, their steam mixing into the morning fog.

Her heart cartwheeled ahead of her, her gut bounding along behind it. Restless and ready.

Jamie turned at her knock, and under Jamie’s gaze, Dani’s skin began a resounding chorus of _today, today, today._


End file.
